Maybe you love peeps. Maybe you hate them. Maybe 10 packages of them somehow wound up in your house this Spring and you'd really love if your kids didn't eat them all! We have a "solution"! Make play dough with them (no detergent or borax required).

In honor of Women's History Month we wanted to share the profiles of six Amazing Women in STEM who inspire and motivate us. We hope and encourage you to share these women's, and those of so many others, stories all year-round!

Through your purchase you are directly supporting our after-school and Saturday programs for girls ages 4-14 that are structured to remodel participants’ relationships with failure, improve critical thinking and problem solving skills, and ultimately inspire more young women to engage with STEM.

It's cold outside and the options to do anything that involve leaving your warm home seem limited at best. But with school delays and closings piling up we wanted to provide a fun STEM activity to keep everyone hopefully occupied and entertained.

One advantage that SUPER cold temperatures have is that they provide an opportunity to create FROZEN BUBBLES! If you're little one created their own "super strength" bubble solution with us then now is a great time to get it out and explore the STEM around bubbles even further. However, if your little one didn't create bubble solution with us there is no need to worry as any store bought bubble solution should suit.

The skin of a bubble is actually made up of three layers (see image) and when temperatures drop (we mean really drop like into the single digits and below) the water layer can begin to freeze!

For the best chance at creating Elsa grade bubbles we'd suggest blowing the bubble and then gently catching them on the wand. As our temperatures may not dip below zero degrees Fahrenheit the bubbles need a little bit of time to sit for the water layer to crystalize.

We hope that you enjoyed your first proper snow days of the year! As this year's forecasts have us braced for quite a bit more snow (perhaps even this Sunday!) we wanted to share a couple of fun STEM snow activities to keep your little ones busy.

Snow Cream

We know eating snow is a debated topic (more info on that here), but if your family decides that eating a little snow is ok with you then here is a fun recipe for Snow Cream. Take some tome to observe the physical changes, melt rate and general snow consistency along the way:

Mix together

1 cup of whole milk or cream

1/2 cup of maple syrup (or sugar although it may be a little grainy)

1 teaspoon real vanilla extract

Pinch of sea salt

Add the mixture above to

8 cups of fresh (CLEAN!) snow. You can even set your collection bowl out when the snow starts to fall to capture the freshest snow.

Mix until the mixture forms an ice cream like consistency. Eat and Enjoy!

Erupting Snow

The science of chemistry is the study of matter and the chemical changes that matter undergoes. Explore Chemistry by combining different substances to try to form snow. Make sure to observe the properties of the substances before and after combining them.

Materials

Baking Soda

Sodium Bicarbonate

Vinegar

Glitter (Optional)

Pipet/ Eye Dropper (Optional)

Container

Instructions

Mix equal parts of baking soda and sodium bicarbonate together in a container. Add glitter if desired.

Use the pipet (or just pour a little bit) to add vinegar to the snow mixture

Whats Happening? When baking soda and shaving cream are mixed together they form a number of new substances including but not limited to sodium stearate, carbon dioxide and water. What makes the snow cold is the process of the liquid in the shaving cream evaporating. The reaction from the vinegar touching the baking soda creates bubbles that release carbon dioxide which is what creates the fizzy look.

At Rosie Riveters we provide hands-on and interactive projects to get girls aged 4-14 excited and engaged in STEM. One project we've wanted to do for AGES but simply haven't had the time during programs (you need at least 24 hours to let them set) is growing crystals! Crystal growing offers a great opportunity to explore suspension, density, and crystallization. This project is not only fun but you are likely to be able to complete it with materials that you already have at home this Fall. With that in mind we give you Crystal Cat Pumpkins!

Rosie Riveters works hard to ignite curiosity in young girls in the subjects of science, technology, math, and engineering. Today, we bring you a special interview with Hope, a participant in our program! She has actually participated in THREE Rosie Riveters programs and a few reunion days! She even volunteered with us to assist with our latest round of K-1st Grade programs. She wants to tell girls that STEM subjects can be challenging, but that's also what makes them fun!

RR: Hi Hope! Thanks for letting us interview you! Thank you for being a part of Rosie Riveters! It's so good to see you have such an interest in STEM.

Do you know what you want to be when you grow up?

Hope: An Engineer or an Architect!

RR: That's so awesome! Very good options!

What does Rosie Riveters mean to you?

Hope: I love Rosie Riveters because it has sparked my interest in engineering!

Rosie has made learning interactive and fun!

RR: We love you too! We are so glad you are loving it so far!

What are your favorite subjects in school?

Hope: Science and Art

RR: Those are great choices. and some of our favorites too! In fact, Rosie Riveters projects always have an element of art! Maybe that's why we vibe so well!

What is the coolest thing you've ever made?

Hope: One of the coolest things I've made in Rosie Riveters is a hydraulic desk lamp! The lamp's light moved up and down based on water pressure. In school, for a fifth-grade science project, I recently created a working model of the first car windshield wiper, as designed by Mary Anderson in 1902.

RR: That's incredible! We love that you love making things and we had fun with those hydraulic lamps! We hope you show us your windshield wiper sometime! What words of encouragement do you have for young girls who are scared to explore science and engineering?

Hope: Don't be scared! The STEM subjects can be challenging but they're also fun. The best part is that they require you to be creative in solving problems.

We hope you are as inspired as we are by Hope! If you or your kids want to get involved with Rosie Riveters, you can learn more about our programs HERE.

Or, you can donate to our cause and help us grow! With your donations, we can reach more girls and inspire them to feel empowered in the subjects of science, technology, engineering, and math!

Rosie Riveters is honored to have partnered with Microsoft to develop and deliver a coding project during our February-March 2016 pilot program and to work with the many experienced, dedicated and enthusiastic Microsoft women who gave their time as volunteers and mentors for our programs. Rosie Riveters is constantly working to expose our participants to tangible, relatable, and real experiences that encourage girls to not only better understand STEM as a field, but also see possibilities for themselves as future engineers, computer programmers, and scientists. So when Microsoft invited our participants to the Microsoft Technology Center (MTC) in Reston,VA we enthusiastically said yes!

But did you know that students lose an average of one to two months of academic knowledge—primarily of science and math—over the summer holiday?

Although the books and calculators have been put away until the fall, summer opens the door to one of the best classrooms for science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM)—the great outdoors. It also affords parents the opportunity to be a part of their child’s learning experience while enjoying quality family time. Here are a few fun (and budget friendly!) ways to incorporate STEM in common summer activities: